{"id":1413,"date":"2024-06-21T14:47:39","date_gmt":"2024-06-21T13:47:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/?p=1413"},"modified":"2024-06-21T14:47:40","modified_gmt":"2024-06-21T13:47:40","slug":"day-20-monthofblogging-june2024-monthofwriting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/2024\/06\/21\/day-20-monthofblogging-june2024-monthofwriting\/","title":{"rendered":"DAY 20 – #MonthOfBlogging #June2024 #MonthOfWriting"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

GETTING AROUND A BLOCKAGE<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Writer\u2019s block. You\u2019ve all heard of it. It\u2019s that time when you want to write, but the words just won\u2019t come. Your muse has departed, and left you… wordless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

POPPYCOCK<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Excuse my language. I do not believe in writer\u2019s block. Neither do these people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Start writing, no matter what. The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on.”<\/strong><\/em>
– Louis L\u2019Amour<\/p>\n\n\n\n

or<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“You can\u2019t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.”<\/strong><\/em>
– Jack London<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let me explain. Sometimes, writing flows. Sometimes, writing doesn\u2019t flow. The reasons? I have no idea – it could be a combination of mental state, tiredness level, enthusiasm, other things happening in our lives… many, many things. And it would be very easy to kowtow to our feelings. And it is made easier by giving those feelings a name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Writer\u2019s Block<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Writers talk about it a lot. It seems to be a common problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But waaay back, when I was thinking I\u2019d quite like to do this thing for a living, I wondered about those days when the writing didn\u2019t flow. What could I do about it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One comment I heard was: \u201cA brain surgeon doesn\u2019t get surgical block.\u201d And the obvious parallel is that when someone does a \u2018normal\u2019 job, they need to do that job, no matter what. And I\u2019m sure on some days, surgeons don\u2019t feel as well as they do on others. Our capability to do a job to the best of our ability varies day to day, but apart from being ill, a surgeon can\u2019t phone in and say he doesn\u2019t feel like doing his \/ her job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So – what\u2019s the solution?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Firstly – STOP USING THE TERM WRITER\u2019S BLOCK<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next thing – tell yourself you\u2019re going to do some writing at the time you normally do your writing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then find some way<\/em> in which you can put characters, words, and sentences onto paper \/ in a file.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here are some suggestions: write a blog post. Sometimes, writing non-fiction will break the deadlock where writing fiction won\u2019t. If you\u2019re not a blogger, and you don\u2019t think you want to be, you can write about something else – maybe write about getting through writer\u2019s block (like I\u2019m doing now!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OR (and I know this worked with a friend I helped) pick a tiny portion of your viewpoint. It doesn\u2019t matter where you are, or what you can see from where you write, but focus on one small portion of your view. Here\u2019s a thing I\u2019ve found useful – extend both arms in front of you, and form a rectangle with the first finger and thumb of each hand. It\u2019s like zooming in on a camera. Don\u2019t choose your view point. That may sound strange, because you\u2019re naturally going to want to choose something interesting to write about. Don\u2019t do that. Bear with me. Extend the arms, form the viewpoint, and look. Really, really look.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Okay, let\u2019s do a test, right now. I have a viewpoint. It\u2019s a small portion of the wall in front of me. So now, let\u2019s write 50 words on what I see. Only 50 words. Be as eloquent or lyrical or poetic as you like.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A shadow falls across the wallpaper, from black to grey to lighter grey to… the off-white wall. But the wall is not one flat colour. There are patters, swirls and whirls and lines and curves, surface texture embossed with semi-random shapes. They make no sense. And yet, suddenly…<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There you go. Exactly fifty words on the wallpaper on my wall. It ain\u2019t gonna win no Pulitzer, nor am I going to publish it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a stage 2, where we enlarge our viewpoint slightly. Bend your arms, form that viewpoint again, and look. Really look. Look throughout the restricted viewpoint, noting what you see, all the details. Now, write 100 words on what you\u2019ve seen through that viewpoint. You can do this. You wrote fifty words a moment or two ago. You just need to write a few more, and now I\u2019ve given you a MUCH bigger thing to write about!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Okay. Done that? Guess what, you don\u2019t have writer\u2019s block!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

GETTING AROUND A BLOCKAGE Writer\u2019s block. You\u2019ve all heard of it. It\u2019s that time when you want to write, but the words just won\u2019t come. Your muse has departed, and left you… wordless. POPPYCOCK Excuse my language. I do not believe in writer\u2019s block. Neither do these people. “Start writing, no matter what. The water […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1415,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[69,6,8,15,16,17],"tags":[70,73,116,46,54,71,117,25],"class_list":["post-1413","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-advice","category-inspiration","category-my-writing","category-thinking","category-writing","category-writing-on-writing","tag-advice","tag-beginner","tag-block","tag-creativity","tag-success","tag-tips","tag-writers-block","tag-writing-2"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/BLOG-writers-block.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5y3CH-mN","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1413"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1413\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1414,"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1413\/revisions\/1414"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gerald-hornsby.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}